Irving Fisher

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Irving Fisher : biography

February 27, 1867 – April 29, 1947

Irving Fisher (February 27, 1867 – April 29, 1947) was an American economist, statistician, inventor, and social campaigner. He was one of the earliest American neoclassical economists, though his later work on debt deflation has been embraced by the Post-Keynesian school., January 24th, 2010, Steve Keen

Fisher made important contributions to utility theory and general equilibrium. He was also a pioneer in the rigorous study of intertemporal choice in markets, which led him to develop a theory of capital and interest rates. His research on the quantity theory of money inaugurated the school of macroeconomic thought known as "monetarism." Both James Tobin and Milton FriedmanMilton Friedman, Money Mischief: Episodes in Monetary History, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (1994) p. 37. ISBN 0-15-661930-X called Fisher "the greatest economist the United States has ever produced."

Fisher was perhaps the first celebrity economist, but his reputation during his lifetime was irreparably harmed by his public statements, just prior to the Wall Street Crash of 1929, claiming that the stock market had reached "a permanently high plateau." His subsequent theory of debt deflation as an explanation of the Great Depression was largely ignored in favor of the work of John Maynard Keynes., The Economist, Feb 12th 2009 His reputation has since recovered in neoclassical economics, particularly after his work was revived in the late 1950sBen Bernanke, Essays on the Great Depression, (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2000), p. 24. ISBN 0-691-01698-4. and more widely due to an increased interest in debt deflation after the late-2000s recession. Some concepts named after Fisher include the Fisher equation, the Fisher hypothesis, the international Fisher effect, and the Fisher separation theorem.

Personal ideals

The lay public perhaps knew Fisher best as a health campaigner and eugenicist. In 1898 he found that he had tuberculosis, the disease that killed his father. After three years in sanatoria, Fisher returned to work with even greater energy and with a second vocation as a health campaigner. He advocated vegetarianism, avoiding red meat and exercise, writing How to Live: Rules for Healthful Living Based on Modern Science, a USA best seller.

In 1912 he also became a member of the scientific advisory to the Eugenics Record Office and was the first president of the American Eugenics Society.

Fisher was also a strong believer in the now-discredited "focal sepsis" theory of physician Henry Cotton, who believed that mental illness was attributable to infectious material residing in the roots of the teeth, recesses in the bowels, and other places in the human body, and that surgical removal of this infectious material would cure the patient’s mental disorder. Fisher believed in these theories so thoroughly that when his daughter Margaret Fisher was diagnosed with schizophrenia, Fisher had numerous sections of his daughter’s bowel and colon removed at Dr. Cotton’s hospital, eventually resulting in her death.Madhouse: A Tragic Tale of Megalomania and Modern Medicine, Andrew Scull, Yale University Press, 2005

Fisher was also an ardent supporter of the Prohibition of alcohol in the United States, and wrote three short books arguing that Prohibition was justified on the grounds of both public health and hygiene, as well as economic productivity and efficiency, and should therefore be strictly enforced by the United States government.Irving Fisher: Prohibition at Its Worst (New York: Macmillan, 1926); Prohibition Still at Its Worst (New York: Alcohol Information Committee, 1928); The Noble Experiment (New York: Alcohol Information Committee, 1930).

Biography

Fisher was born in Saugerties, New York. His father was a teacher and a Congregational minister, who raised his son to believe he must be a useful member of society. Despite being raised in religious family, he later on became an atheist. As a child, he had remarkable mathematical ability and a flair for invention. A week after he was admitted to Yale College his father died, at age 53. Irving then supported his mother, brother, and himself, mainly by tutoring. He graduated first in his class with a B.A degree in 1888, having also been elected as a member of the Skull and Bones society.